February 16, 2010

In his crusade against guns, Mayor Bloomberg has sometimes used sting operations against out-of-town vendors, sending decoys to gun shows to act like they don’t have legal standing to make a purchase, and publicizing the resulting illegal sales. Now a West Virginia state legislator is trying to make it illegal for Bloomberg to do so.

State senator Jeffrey Kessler has proposed what he calls a “Bloomberg bill,” making it a felony to draw vendors into such stings. He cites the Second Amendment, but also claims Bloomberg’s actions “may well be compromising actual law enforcement activities” to curb such sales.

Bloomberg’s gun prosecutions have suffered some reversals of late: His suit against dealer Jay Wallace got sent down to Georgia, Wallace’s home, where the dealer has been represented by former Libertarian presidential candidate Bob Barr. That case is ongoing. And last year the Supreme Court refused to hear the big anti-gunmaker case Bloomberg inherited from Mayor Giuliani, which had been defeated in the lower courts. Maybe some of his toughness on local offenders results from frustration.

When not fighting off Bloomberg, Kessler is waging a war against cock- and dog-fighting in his state, which he says “sends a horrible message that West Virginia is still a bunch of backwoods, ‘Deliverance’ Neanderthals who find some type of entertainment in a blood sport of watching a couple of animals fight.”